Hoste Da Reggia Music Recordings and Sheet Music

Born

c. 1520

Died

1569

Birthplace

Reggio nell'Emilia, Italy

Hoste da Reggio (Bartolomeo Torresano) was an Italian composer of the Renaissance, active in Milan and elsewhere in northern Italy. He was well known for his madrigals, which were published in several collections in Venice.
Hoste da Reggio's style showed many of the characteristics of the mid-century madrigal, which was at that time evolving along several different paths. He published his madrigals in five volumes in Venice between 1547 and 1554.
Some of the methods of madrigal composition common around 1550 which can be found in Hoste's music includechromaticism, unusual chord progressions, especially around cadences, and note nere (black-note) writing. In the note nere style, quick passages (written in filled-in notes, i.e., "black" notes) alternate with slower-moving sections, often in extreme contrast. Another stylistic strain evident in Hoste's writing is the "arioso" manner, in which one or more of the voices sings in a more declamatory style, anticipating later developments in the century such as the solo madrigal, and an increasing importance of soprano and bass parts; prior to this time, especially in the contrapuntal style of the Franco-Flemish school in the 1540s, absolute evenness of parts was an ideal, in which no one part predominated in the texture.
Occasionally he used a repeating melody in the soprano line, with the lower parts accompanying it differently each time it recurs. This most likely shows the influence of Francesco Corteccia, the famous musician and madrigalist to the Medici inFlorence, who was consciously melding art and popular music styles. The procedure of using a simple repeating line in this manner was to be revived in the Baroque era, most often as a ground bass, and again in the cantatas of J.S. Bach.
Hoste also published a book of magnificats and motets; this one collection of sacred music (1550) appeared in Milan instead of Venice.